内容摘要：A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said it knew "how frustrating and distressing" medicine supply issues can be for patients and clinicians caring for them.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said it knew "how frustrating and distressing" medicine supply issues can be for patients and clinicians caring for them.

Although it could also be used to access natural resources such as minerals and water, the firm added,Mabasa and Karberg told the BBC that in their view, productive agricultural land could not be expropriated without compensation.

They said any expropriation without compensation – known as EWC – could take place only in a few circumstances:Owners would probably still get compensation for the buildings on the land and for the natural resources, the lawyers said.Mabasa and Karberg added that EWC was "not aimed at rural land or farmland specifically, and could include land in urban areas".

However, in cases where compensation is paid, the rules are set to change, with owners likely to get less money.The plan is for owners to receive "just-and-equitable" compensation – a departure from the higher "market value" they have been getting up to now, Mabasa and Karberg said.

The government had been paying market-value compensation despite the fact that this was "at odds" with the constitution, adopted after white-minority rule ended in 1994, they added.

The lawyers said that all expropriations had "extensive procedural fairness requirements", including the owner's right to go to court if they were not happy.The Department of Health (DoH) said that, in future, patients would be able to claim back money for operations in the rest of the EU.

But a date has yet to be set for when that extension will happen, and the number of patients able to avail of it will depend on how much money is left from the cross-border scheme."The second phase of the scheme – extension to the rest of the EU – will go ahead," a DoH spokesperson said.

"The scale of available funding will clearly be connected to take-up levels for the first phase."The department is already facing a £600m deficit in its budget as it struggles to reduce waiting lists and fund pay increases for healthcare workers.